


Quotidian

by Domenika Marzione (domarzione)



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Case Fic, Gen, Team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-28
Updated: 2011-06-28
Packaged: 2017-10-20 19:21:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/216263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/domarzione/pseuds/Domenika%20Marzione
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aaron Hotchner, day by day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quotidian

"Why is there no Van Buren Street in Hoboken?"

Aaron, who'd been lulled into a half-drowse by the quiet inside the van and the steady lack of progress of traffic outside, didn't respond. It wasn't a question directed at him per se, just one of Reid's out-loud moments, an audible bubbling of his swift-flowing mental stream. Anyone's answer would be good enough.

Except nobody did answer, possibly because they were all affected by the same transit stupor Aaron was or, equally possible, they were wary of being set up by Reid. Whose guilelessness did not always sufficiently counteract the effect of his tendency to intellectually bludgeon even those he held most dear.

"I get why there's no second Adams Street," Reid went on, dashing Aaron's hope that Reid would take the lack of response for what it was. "It would be confusing, although they could have gone with an Adams Avenue. But why no Van Buren? Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, then it skips to Harrison."

The sheriff's deputy, in the driver's seat next to Aaron, was the last best hope at ending this quickly. But he kept his eyes firmly on the unmoving cars ahead of him and Aaron sighed quietly.

"Maybe they didn't like that he was a New Yorker," he suggested, knowing it was not the answer.

"There are three... no, four Van Buren Streets in New Jersey," Reid countered, pleased to finally have a conversation partner. Even if it wasn't a conversation.

"Maybe they lost track," Aaron offered, looking out over the view afforded by the Pulaski Skyway. He'd almost memorized it in the hour they'd been idling there, trapped between a cramped Continental Airlines flight and messy serial murder-rapist terrorizing Hudson County. The Gulfstream was on its way to some remote dirt airfield in South Dakota, ferrying Rowland's team to their own grisly engagement; Strauss had reminded Aaron that there were countless alternatives for his team to get to their destination. And all of them would have had them exactly where they were now, stuck on Route 1/9 going nowhere.

"Hoboken was incorporated in 1855," Reid said. "Van Buren was against abolition. Maybe it was a statement."

Sensing no affirmation was required, Aaron leaned his head against the window and closed his eyes.

* * *

The victims:

  

  * Five black women in their mid-twenties (except for Shantiqua White, who was nineteen but could have easily passed for twenty-five). Nadine Wyatte, Carisse Johnson, Shantiqua White, Daian LaCrosse, BriAnna Jefferson. 
  

  * All victims were unmarried. Four had children, three more than one (nine total, by seven different fathers, ages 2 months to 9 years). Three were living in public housing. One (Wyatte) came from an affluent family. Two were unemployed, one worked off-the-books, one freelanced. One had a criminal record (White; criminal possession 3rd degree). 
  

  * All were found in large greenspaces adjacent to the water. Dump sites; they had not been killed where they had been found, but there was no positive identification of any kill site(s). 
  

  * The unsub was killing on Sunday nights, moving north from the park at the base of the Bayonne Bridge (LaCrosse) and, with the last victim, had crossed city lines into Jersey City. The most recent victim (Jefferson) had been found on the Liberty National Golf Course. The park due north of it was Liberty State Park, which had a ferry link to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty and New York City and was the reason the Hudson County Sheriff had stopped insisting that the FBI's help was not needed. 
  

  * None of the victims lived or worked in Bayonne, where the first four victims had been found. The victim found in Jersey City (Jefferson) did not live there, but had worked at the Newport Centre mall. 
  

  * All victims were raped and then manually asphyxiated (one hand over the mouth and nose). Bruising at the wrists indicate that the unsub held their arms over their heads with his hand(s). The unsub used a condom during the rape. There was no DNA. 
  

  * All victims were re-dressed afterward and seated on a bench facing the water (except for LaCrosse, who had been propped up against the base of a light stanchion because there were no benches in the area). Their faces were cleaned with makeup-removal pads (Almay brand). Their hands were treated with hand sanitizer (CVS house brand) and placed on their laps over their purses/bags. The positioning and care taken with the bodies delayed recognition/identification in the first four cases; public appeals for witnesses revealed that earlier passers-by had not realized that the women were dead. Whether the fifth victim's easy discovery was a change in MO by the unsub or simply a consequence of it being a golf course and not a public park was unknown. 
  



They had delivered the profile within hours of their arrival. It was straightforward as far as these things went, but they'd all been on the job too long to confuse straightforward with simple or easy. Organized unsubs were never simple and this one was both meticulous and highly skilled, able to withstand the scrutiny of multiple law enforcement agencies and a determined press and a citizenry that had been especially vigilant and watchful since a sunny late-summer morning in September 2001. Especially here, where people had looked out their windows and seen the burning Twin Towers and wondered if their loved ones were coming home.

Out on the street, there was a tension and a wariness that stifled.

The case was sensitive, the Sheriff needlessly repeated at least five times a day. The unsub was going after black girls, going after girls from the projects with young children, going after girls from Newark -- which had that city's mayor's office calling increasingly outraged press conferences until JJ had gone over there to get them to stop. She was having less success with the _New York Post_ , which was running ever more strident headlines on the cover and sensationalist columns on the inside. The Jersey papers were being more amenable, at least as far as not making things worse, as was the _New York Daily News_. The _New York Times_ did not care, choosing only to run a wire story on the front page of the Metro section. Television coverage was cyclical, revving up as Sunday approached and Monday brought grim discoveries and winding down by Wednesday, when the focus switched to American Idol for a couple of cycles.

Today was Wednesday, but that did not bring much relief. They were no closer to identifying the unsub now than they had been on Monday morning. The evidence they had pointed everywhere and nowhere. For all of the demographic similarities, the victims' lives had not meaningfully overlapped. They had not lived, worked, or shopped in the same places. They had received their benefits, if any, from different offices. Their children did not go to school together. They did not have common phone numbers in their call logs. There was some minor overlapping of acquaintances, but nothing had panned out.

"I am so sorry, sir. This isn't like me."

Garcia was beside herself, frustrated with her own impotence. Aaron felt for her, genuinely and sincerely. But right now, she was just one more fragile ego he had to prop up and he was running out of strength for the task. He'd been straddling the line between demanding more -- something, anything! -- from his team and appreciating that from nothing came nothing. Except so often with his team it did and expectations, both his own and their own, were high. And hope was plummeting from that great height, falling ever downward as they drew closer to Sunday night.

Half of the police in the state of New Jersey were going to be in Liberty State Park this weekend, with an extra set over at Lincoln Park, the next most northerly park, just in case. Aaron wasn't the only one on his team who understood how little difference that would make.

"Do your best, Penelope," he told her. "It's all anyone can do right now."

* * *

"Goodnight, Daddy," Jack said, leaning forward to kiss his father's image on the screen. The positioning of the laptop's camera meant that Aaron got a screen full of his son's forehead and hair, which made him smile, which in turn made Jack smile wider. Jack waved until Jessica ended the call.

Jack was much more communicative over Skype than over the phone, so that was what they used when Aaron was away. Sometimes Aaron wished they didn't because Jack was getting much more observant than he used to be and would point out when he thought his father looked in need of a nap or, more often, sad. But most of the time Aaron was grateful because just seeing Jack was welcome solace. His son was an embodiment of what wonderful miracles life could bring, that humans were capable of creating more than horror. Something that Aaron could too often forget as cases dragged on.

It was Friday evening. They'd lost most of a day because a politician in Trenton had called in the race-baiters, who in turn were now demanding to know why the FBI was focusing on black men as the likely perpetrators, why the police were so busy living their prejudices that they couldn't help the black women who needed their strength and not their biases.

Morgan, irate at the demagoguery, had volunteered -- begged -- to be the one to answer their challenges, to at least point out that it was extremely likely that a rapist chose victims of his own race, but Aaron had forbade it. There was no way to win an argument with these types, he'd told Derek. There was too much to do that could help. "I need you here with us," was what had finally stilled the caged-tiger impulse.

A sharp knock on the office door. Aaron knew who it was before the door opened. "We're taking a dinner break," Emily said. "Come with us?"

She waited, just her head inside the doorway. They'd given him the privacy of the small office off of the conference room they were using; a separate space to keep Jack, even a digital version of Jack, away from any more ugliness than he'd already seen.

Aaron didn't feel like eating; the case was starting to ruin his appetite as well as his sleep. Emily must have sensed what his answer would be because she gave him one of _those_ looks, the one she usually saved for Reid when he was being especially obtuse. "Did I mention that this break involves a multi-block walk in fresh air that doesn't smell of scorched coffee and disinfectant?"

He was too tired to put up a fight and he'd asked too much of his team to start pulling rank because he was moody. "Sounds lovely," he said, standing up.

"That's because you've forgotten that our fresh air currently comes from New Jersey," Emily replied, opening the door all of the way. "How's Jack?"

"Jack had ham and cheese for lunch and chocolate milk for snack and pork chop for dinner and he's a little put out that Aunt Jessica made him eat all of his carrots," Aaron answered, unable to keep from grinning. Jack's descriptions of his day began and ended with everything he'd eaten; Aaron had to specifically ask about things like daycare or playmates or why he was wearing a band-aid.

"What, no dessert?" Emily asked as they passed through the conference room with its walls covered in photographs and maps and photocopies of official records.

"I was keeping him from his pie," Aaron explained. "It's safer for the laptop if he eats it after we talk."

Emily's low, throaty laughter did not follow them out into the squad room, where all good humor went to die.

* * *

"So near and yet so far."

Aaron looked up to see Dave with his eyes on lower Manhattan across New York Harbor. They were standing by the railing next to the Communipaw Terminal, the only quiet spot in an area full of emergency responders, crime scene investigators, and the milling groups of state troopers and sheriff's deputies who'd spent the night watching for a killer who'd eluded them.

The interviews would take place in the museum, which would be closed for the day along with the rest of the park and the ferry and water taxi terminals. The park was big and there were many access points, including the water, but with over a hundred LEOs, someone must have seen something.

Except then how did the unsub bring Patrice Grinnel, age 23, to a bench near the band shell and slip away again?

"You'd think there'd be more of a City vibe here," Dave went on. "We're a good swim from Wall Street, closer than half of the people who actually pay New York City taxes. Hop on the PATH at Journal Square and we'd be in the West Village in ten. They share a media market, weather, sports teams. But it's like the Island. The City is somewhere else, not someplace right next door. We might as well be in Decatur."

There was an undertone to Dave's voice that made it clear that that was a reason he was glad to have left Long Island. One of many.

"It's like that in Virginia, too," Aaron pointed out. "The District and then Everything Else."

"DC isn't anywhere any sane person would want to be," Dave retorted. "This is New York."

Aaron took one last deep breath of diesel fuel and salty sea air, one last look at the Statue of Liberty, and pushed off the railing. "Come on," he said. "We've got work to do."

Near the makeshift command center, Emily broke away from the circle of commanders she was instructing to tell him that Morgan and Reid were not yet back from their meeting over at Port Jersey. The Port Authority and Coast Guard had been involved since before the BAU had been invited in; that all of the dump sites had water access had to matter one way or another. There'd been extra riverine patrols and sweeps along the western side of the Upper Harbor every weekend, but nothing had turned up.

Strauss called while Aaron was getting briefed by JJ on how they were going to deal with the media horde currently penned in by the Science Center. She was displeased, unhappy with the amount of heat that was being brought to bear on her and determined to share it with him, but kept her demands and accusations just this side of reasonable and so Aaron was able to keep his temper. It's not like he hadn't had the practice.

Which did not mean that he didn't need to take the scenic route on his way back to rejoin JJ and Emily.

Dave intercepted him, holding up his phone. "Derek called," he announced while they were still far enough apart that he had to raise his voice. "While you were being shat upon by Strauss. It seems one of the Coast Guard's riverine patrol boats came into the harbor last night when it shouldn't have. They're trying to track down the operators now."

* * *

The race to catch Port Authority Detective Jerome Harbin became more urgent after the bodies of two Coast Guard petty officers were found in the Passaic River; they had been the commander and driver of the boat Harbin had been seconded to. Harbin, a CID detective, shouldn't have been at sea at all, but that particular TPSB had been short a man after their third man had been rushed off to the ER with acute appendicitis an hour before launching and Harbin had boat experience from his time with the ESU.

PO3 Hauer was still too drugged up to be told that his near-death experience had actually saved his life.

While the PAPD, state troopers, and sheriff's office were chasing down Harbin, Aaron and Reid were trying to come up with some kind of link between him and his presumptive victims. Emily and Dave had gone to Harbin's apartment, Morgan was riding with the deputies who'd been driving him around all morning. The hardest job awaited, though, and so Aaron left Reid to work with Garcia, choosing to go himself to the PAPD headquarters and try to find someone who knew Harbin well and wasn't either out looking or looking out for him.

Harbin was well-liked, a happy jokester known for his willingness to go the extra mile for a good gag and his Thursday night ritual of dinner at Je's. Aaron could feel the air chill around him as he drew cold stares for what he was there to do.

Harbin's partner, a Detective Perreira, was so sure that Harbin was innocent, that his body would be washing up somewhere else on the banks of the Passaic, that he was already starting to grieve. He lashed out at Aaron, at the entire "witch hunt," at how they were trying to frame a good guy just to get the heat off their backs.

Aaron took it all, accepting the denial for what it was. When Perreira wound down, Aaron calmly went through the profile checklist, getting Perreira to confirm almost all of it, even though there were exculpatory reasons offered with every answer.

"Jesus, Hotchner. You want to pick out every guy in this unit with a detail fetish and a military background? This is the fucking Criminal Investigative Division. You'd have to take all of us in."

Reid called and Aaron had to get him to slow down and repeat himself.

"Tell me about Cherry Johnston," Aaron demanded of Perreira, who blinked in surprise, expecting a different line of questioning.

"Jerry's ex-girlfriend?" he asked, disbelieving. "Why?"

Aaron pulled the appropriate folder and slid it over to Perreira. "Because she was the second murder victim. And she had never met Jerome Harbin before he killed her."

Up until five years ago, Carisse Johnson had worked at a now-closed hair salon off Martin Luther King Boulevard in Newark's Central Ward. Jerome Harbin had lived across the street. Daian LaCrosse had been a customer, although Reid had not yet been able to confirm whether any of the other victims had been as well. But the Johnson family had confirmed that Carisse had never gone as "Cherry," had never had trouble with any official misspelling of her last name, and she'd never dated Jerome Harbin. Which made the discovery of framed photographs of her in Harbin's apartment all the more curious. Tasteful photographs, seemingly posed for the photographer, Emily had reported. Johnson had reported a break-in three years ago, but she lived in a project in Springfield/Belmont and, as the Newark police had sourly explained, it had only been unusual in that her television had still been there when she'd gotten home.

Carisse Johnson had been stalked and had never realized it.

Perreira was going through the other photos of Johnson that the family had given them and paused now on one. "Jesus fucking christ."

He turned it over to show Aaron. It was a photo of Johnson in a soft pink dress holding a bouquet of flowers in white-gloved hands, like she was part of a church wedding. Her hair had been relaxed and brushed out, giving her a much younger and softer appearance than the more current photo the newspapers had been running. The lack of recognition would be understandable. "Jerry had this up on his desk while they were going out."

* * *

It took twenty-nine hours to track down Harbin, who'd gone to ground in Camden, New Jersey. By that point, Garcia and Reid had been able to connect the rest of the victims to Harbin and/or Johnson and fill out the background and supporting documentation.

"Can we take the train home?" Reid asked as they were finishing up in the conference room. "I'd like to take the train home."

"Strauss might not approve it," Dave replied before Aaron could say anything. "It's more expensive than flying."

It was not more expensive than flying, but it was close. Nonetheless, it was easier because it allowed for their schedule's uncertainty and it didn't add too much time to their trip and so, with no one else stating a preference one way or the other, they boarded a DC-bound Acela at Newark Penn Station.

But not before getting stuck in traffic on the 1/9 on the way there.

The ride home was quiet, much more peaceful than the airplane up. The train was half-full from its previous stops and they couldn't all sit together. Aaron nonetheless ended up sitting next to Dave, who proceeded to pull out his iPhone and his headphones and, with an insouciant grin, ignore him completely.

Somewhere before Wilmington, Aaron thought he might have fallen asleep. He was awake when the train left BWI, however, but whether because of Dave's elbow or just his own internal alarm clock he didn't know. He still felt groggy, but not the sort of thick-headed that came with not enough sleep and too much work. It was the sort that came with having a four-year-old who considered dawn an acceptable time to rise even on the weekends. Jack, who'd greet his father with a hug and a kiss and a litany of everything he'd eaten that day, was less than an hour away.


End file.
